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Antigone: Greek Audience • The Greek audience would have been familiar with the story and the characters. • An understanding of Antigone’s family and her father’s fate helps to put the events of the play in context. • Sophocles would have only used three actors in the original production (a Greek drama competition regulation). The Oedipus Myth • Oedipus was born of Jocasta and Laius (the rulers of Thebes), a great but starcrossed family. • Prophecy warns that the boy would grow up to murder his father and marry his mother. • See handout. Antigone Summary • In the battle for the throne of Thebes, Antigone’s brothers Eteocles and Polyneices fight for and against the city. • Creon, king of Thebes, gives Eteocles a soldier’s funeral, but decrees that Polyneices’ body remain unburied. • Antigone defies the decree, without Ismene's help, and buries the body. Summary continued • After a sentry rats out Antigone, Creon then condemns both Antigone and Ismene to death. • He later changes his mind about Ismene, and locks Antigone away in a stone vault. • Haemon, Creon’s son, who is in love with Antigone, pleads with his father to do the right move, but Creon ignores this plea. Summary continued • The blind prophet Tiresias then proves that “the gods” are on Antigone’s side, and he warns Creon of his immoral actions. • Creon then changes his tune, but upon going to actually bury Polyneices himself, Haemon attacks him and then kills himself. • When the news of this spreads, Creon’s wife, Eurydice, kills herself, and Creon is left utterly alone at the end of the play. Conflicts in Antigone • • • • Man versus Man Man versus the environment Man versus the supernatural Man versus himself. Issues in Antigone • Families torn apart by political differences, • Overall family dysfunction, • Gender bias, • The death penalty, • Suicide, • Fate.